VIENNA, March 3: Austria’s new government took office on Monday, with Christian Stocker taking over as chancellor at the head of a three-party coalition after a five-month wait for a new administration.
The new government will have to deal with rising unemployment, a recession and a creaking budget.
Its coalition agreement, reached on Thursday after the longest negotiations in post-World War II Austria, foresees strict new asylum rules in the European Union country of 9 million people.
Related Posts:
This is the country’s first three-party government, bringing together Stocker’s conservative Austrian People’s Party, the centre-left Social Democrats and the liberal Neos.
The alliance in the political centre came together only at the second attempt after the far-right Freedom Party emerged as the strongest political force in a parliamentary election on September 29.
A first attempt collapsed in early January, prompting the resignation of then-Chancellor Karl Nehammer, who had said his party wouldn’t work under Freedom Party leader Herbert Kickl.
Stocker took over from Nehammer as leader of the People’s Party and went into negotiations with Kickl on a possible coalition, but those collapsed on February 12 amid mutual finger-pointing.
The three parties in the centre then renewed their effort to find common ground, heading off the possibility of an early election.
Stocker, 64, becomes chancellor although he wasn’t running for the job when Austrians voted in September and hasn’t served in a national government before. Social Democratic leader Andreas Babler is the new vice chancellor.
Neos leader Beate Meinl-Reisinger takes over as foreign minister from Alexander Schallenberg, who also served as interim chancellor for the past two months after Nehammer’s resignation and isn’t part of the new Cabinet. (AP)
